US Conference of Mayors: take back the city ... by gimleteye

There is leadership in Miami's African American community: The Miami Workers Center, coordinating activities around the US Conference of Mayors.


Its not just the price of the ticket
Miami Times, June18, 2008 - Aiyeshia Hudson

Barack Obama will address the nation’s mayors at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Miami, this week. While the mayors and the candidate discuss urban solutions to some of the most pressing issues of our time, a very important group will be absent form the room: the majority. With tickets topping out at $1,650 it is no wonder that the majority of people can’t seem to get a seat at the table. But it isn’t just the price of ticket that keeps us out.

Mayors nationwide are appealing to the minority of special interest, private companies, developers and speculators instead of the majority: small businesses, families, community organizations that make up our city. These partnerships of big capital with power holders are playing out the city, regional and federal levels. Deals are cut to funnel public money into the private sector without accountability.

In Miami, no new affordable housing has been built for the most low income families, even at the height of the housing crisis. Instead, politicians gave land and infrastructure to developers for mega-developments. Access to public education is under attack as children are seen more as criminals than students. In Florida alone budgets for schools were cut while spending on prisons are increasing. Social service programs were gutted using racist justifications while tax cuts continue for the richest of the rich. This divestment from the public good, the good of the majority of residents, and funneling of money from public good to private interest is the crux of neo-liberalism.

Neo-liberal policies are destroying our cities. Under neo-liberalism , public goods are used or sold for corporate welfare . There is only one bottom line: profit. Other needs and values, such as community health, environmental sustainability, education, affordable housing, fair jobs, and access to public space all become deprioritized.

Rather than regulate these deals to protect and also serve the community, politicians are signing over our cities to the highest campaign contributor. A minority of businessmen, developers, and speculators should not be dictating the policies, programs, and services of our cities.

During the U.S. Conference of Mayors, residents from across the country will converge on Miami to demand an end to the neo-liberal high-jacking of our cities and assert a right to the city for all people. This mobilization, the March on the Mayors, is organized by the Right to City National Alliance (RTTC). Composed of grassroots community organizations from 7 mega-metropolitan regions in the U.S., RTTC is building a movement for a democratic human right to the city with racial justice, economic justice and self determination at its core.

Over 150 national delegates and 300 Miami residents will gather in a summit to start building a national urban platform, the People’s State of the City Summit. They will perform a New Orleans Jazz Funeral, led by the New Orleans second-line To Be Continued brass band. Marchers will bury coffins and giant skeleton puppets symbolizing the worst of our cities: gentrification, racism bad governance, and celebrate a growing movement for urban justice. Finally, RTTC is collaborating with Katrina Information Network to lobby U.S. mayors to stop doing business with FEMA contractors who were cited by U.S. Congress for profiteering from Hurricane Katrina relief efforts.

Today, our economy is entering a tailspin and countless condos towers stand dark and empty on the tropical horizon. Over 1,100 African-American residents displaced with the destruction of Scott Carver Homes, thousands of long term mobile home park residents face eviction as landlords try to flip their land, and slumlords are squeezing rent out of tenants in terrible living conditions banking on an overall lack of affordable housing. It is clear where corporate control of our politicians has gotten us: the wrong direction.

Clearly it is time to take our cities back. RTTC is united around the principles of: land for people vs. land for speculation, land ownership, economic justice, indigenous justice, environmental justice, freedom from police harassment, immigrant justice, community institutions, democracy and participation, reparations, international solidarity, and rural justice. When we make it simple we are united and fighting for our democratic human right to the city, a right that has been denied for too long.